ICT news

• Amazon Luna Can Now Play Games You Own On PC, No Channel Subscriptions Required

  06-12-2022 23:40 via games.slashdot.org
  Amazon Luna is one of the better cloud gaming options if you play a lot of Ubisoft titles, and it's getting a big upgrade this week. You can now sync purchases on Luna to PC and play without a subscription. 9to5Google reports: Since its launch, Amazon Luna has worked solely on a subscription model. Players can access games through "channels," each of which includes a rotating selection of games. One of those channels is Ubisoft+, which has a selection of Ubisoft games for $17.99/month that can s
  
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• Apple Loosens Grip On App Store Pricing With 700 New Price Points

  06-12-2022 23:02 via apple.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: Apple is loosening its requirements around how developers have to price their apps as legal and regulatory pressure over its tight control of the App Store intensifies. The company announced today it's expanding its App Store pricing system to offer developers access to 700 additional price points, bringing the new total number of price points available to 900. It will also allow U.S. developers to set prices for apps, in-app purchases or subs
  
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• Telegram Premium Tops 1 Million Subscribers

  06-12-2022 22:21 via tech.slashdot.org
  Telegram Premium has amassed over 1 million subscribers, less than six months after the popular instant messaging app launched the paid offering and began a serious effort to monetize the business. From a report: Pavel Durov shared the update on his Telegram channel Tuesday, calling the milestone "one of the most successful examples of a social media subscription plan ever launched." The subscription, however, still "represents just a fraction of Telegram's overall revenue," he shared in the sam
  
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• Amazon is Offering Customers $2 Per Month For Letting the Company Monitor the Traffic on Their Phones

  06-12-2022 21:41 via yro.slashdot.org
  Some Amazon users will now earn $2 dollar per month for agreeing to share their traffic data with the retail giant. From a report: Under the company's new invite-only Ad Verification program, Amazon is tracking what ads participants saw, where they saw them, and the time of day they were viewed. This includes Amazon's own ads and third-party ads on the platform. Through the program, Amazon hopes to offer more personalized-ad experiences to customers that reflect what they have previously purchas
  
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• Intel's Take on the Next Wave of Moore's Law

  06-12-2022 21:00 via tech.slashdot.org
  The next wave of Moore's Law will rely on a developing concept called system technology co-optimization, Ann B. Kelleher, general manager of technology development at Intel told IEEE Spectrum in an interview ahead of her plenary talk at the 2022 IEEE Electron Device Meeting. From a report: "Moore's Law is about increasing the integration of functions," says Kelleher. "As we look forward into the next 10 to 20 years, there's a pipeline full of innovation" that will continue the cadence of improve
  
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• Apple Scales Back Self-Driving Car and Delays Debut Till '26

  06-12-2022 19:58 via apple.slashdot.org
  Apple has scaled back ambitious self-driving plans for its future electric vehicle and postponed the car's target launch date by about a year to 2026, Bloomberg reported Tuesday, citing people with knowledge of the matter. From the report: The car project, dubbed Titan inside the company, has been in limbo for the past several months as Apple executives grappled with the reality that its vision for a fully autonomous vehicle -- without a steering wheel or pedals -- isn't feasible with current te
  
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• Google Search Brings Continuous Scrolling To Desktop

  06-12-2022 19:45 via tech.slashdot.org
  Google's search results on desktop will load in a continuous scroll instead of dividing into pages, the company has announced. From a report: The move follows a similar change made on mobile in October last year, but isn't quite an "infinite" scroll. Instead, Google will load six pages of results into a single scroll before offering users a "See more" button to show more results. Google says the change is rolling out first for English searches in the US, but judging by the rollout of the feature
  
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• The World Cup of Microsoft Excel

  06-12-2022 19:01 via tech.slashdot.org
  Competitive Excel clearly is not the NFL, but it does have the beginnings of a fan base. From a report: This was just the second year of the World Championship, but it's already streaming on ESPN3. This year's edition has 30,000 views on YouTube. Supporters of Michael Jarman, the No. 3 seed in this year's competition, call themselves the "Jarmy Army." A few months ago, an all-star game of sorts aired on ESPN2, and this month, ESPNU will televise the collegiate championship. The tournament begins
  
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• France Bans Short Haul Domestic Flights in Favour of Train Travel

  06-12-2022 18:21 via tech.slashdot.org
  France has been given the green light to ban short haul domestic flights. The European Commission has approved the move which will abolish flights between cities that are linked by a train journey of less than 2.5 hours. From a report: The decision was announced on Friday. The changes are part of the country's 2021 Climate Law and were first proposed by France's Citizens' Convention on Climate -- a citizens' assembly tasked with finding ways to reduce the country's carbon emissions. France is al
  
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• Syntax Errors Are the Doom of Us All, Including Botnet Authors

  06-12-2022 17:45 via it.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader shares a report: KmsdBot, a cryptomining botnet that could also be used for denial-of-service (DDOS) attacks, broke into systems through weak secure shell credentials. It could remotely control a system, it was hard to reverse-engineer, didn't stay persistent, and could target multiple architectures. KmsdBot was a complex malware with no easy fix. That was the case until researchers at Akamai Security Research witnessed a novel solution: forgetting to put a space between an I
  
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• ConsenSys To Update MetaMask Crypto Wallet in Response To Privacy Backlash

  06-12-2022 17:05 via tech.slashdot.org
  ConsenSys, the company behind the MetaMask crypto wallet, said Tuesday it will release a series of updates to the platform in response to user backlash regarding its data-collection practices. From a report: In a statement, the company explained how and why it was sharing MetaMask user internet-protocol information with Infura, the ConsenSys-made RPC (remote procedure call) service for reading and writing data to the Ethereum blockchain. A change in wording to the ConsenSys user agreement last m
  
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• Microsoft Eyes 'Super App' To Break Apple and Google's Hold on Mobile Search

  06-12-2022 16:32 via tech.slashdot.org
  Microsoft recently considered building a "super app" that could combine shopping, messaging, web search, news feeds and other services in a one-stop smartphone app, in what would be an ambitious move by the software giant to expand further into consumer services, The Information reported Tuesday, citing people with direct knowledge of the discussions. From the report: Microsoft executives wanted the app to boost the company's multibillion-dollar advertising business and Bing search, as well as d
  
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• Amazon Agrees Final Deal To Close EU Antitrust Probes

  06-12-2022 16:04 via tech.slashdot.org
  Amazon has reached a final deal with EU antitrust regulators over concerns its use of data undermined rivals, in a move that will close two of the most high-profile probes in Brussels. From a report: The US ecommerce group has committed to increasing the visibility of rival products by giving them equal treatment on Amazon's "buy box," which generates the majority of purchases on the site. It will also create an alternative featured offer for those buyers where speed of delivery is less importan
  
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• Apple Expands Self Service Repair To iPhone and MacBook Users in Europe

  06-12-2022 15:03 via apple.slashdot.org
  Apple has announced that its Self Service Repair store for iPhones and MacBooks is now open for business in Europe. From a report: First announced last November, the repair program essentially enables anyone to purchase genuine Apple components to repair their damaged devices, while the Cupertino company also provides online manuals to guide consumers through the self-service repair process. It's worth noting that while the program is open to anyone where the repair store is available, repairing
  
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• Meta Threatens To Pull News From Facebook If Congress Passes Media Bill

  06-12-2022 14:00 via news.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from CNET: Facebook parent company Meta on Monday threatened to remove news from its social media platform in the US if Congress approves a bill that would allow news organizations to collectively bargain with tech companies for compensation. Andy Stone, Meta's head of policy communications, wrote on Twitter that Facebook would "be forced to consider removing news" if the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act becomes law. He added that the proposal fails
  
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• SpaceX Unveils 'Starshield,' a Military Variation of Starlink Satellites

  06-12-2022 11:00 via tech.slashdot.org
  Elon Musk's SpaceX is expanding its Starlink satellite technology into military applications with a new business line called Starshield. CNBC reports: "While Starlink is designed for consumer and commercial use, Starshield is designed for government use," the company wrote on its website. Few details are available about the intended scope and capabilities of Starshield. The company hasn't previously announced tests or work on Starshield technology.On its website, SpaceX said the system will have
  
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• Microsoft-Backed Start-Up Heirloom Uses Limestone To Capture CO2

  06-12-2022 08:00 via news.slashdot.org
  California-based startup Heirloom is using limestone to capture CO2 from the atmosphere to reduce carbon emissions and prevent the worst effects of global warming. CNBC reports: CO2 naturally occurs in limestone. Heirloom removes that CO2 by heating the limestone into a powder and stores the extracted CO2 underground. The remaining powder is then thirsty for more CO2. Heirloom spread that powder out on trays, with a robot determining location for maximum CO2 absorption. A process that naturally
  
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• 'NASA's Plan To Make JWST Data Immediately Available Will Hurt Astronomy'

  06-12-2022 04:30 via science.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader shares an excerpt from an opinion piece in Scientific American, written by Jason Wright. Wright is a professor of astronomy and astrophysics at Pennsylvania State University, where he is director of the Penn State Extraterrestrial Intelligence Center. From the piece: In August the White House announced (PDF) that the results of all federally funded research should be freely accessible by the end of 2025. This will be a big change for scientists in many fields but ultimately a
  
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• Microsoft Offers Sony a 10-Year Deal On New CoD Games, Plans To Raise Game Prices Next Year

  06-12-2022 03:02 via games.slashdot.org
  In an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal today, Microsoft president Brad Smith said the company has offered Sony a 10-year contract to make future Call of Duty games available on PlayStation if its proposed Activision Blizzard acquisition gets approved. Microsoft initially offered to keep the popular game series on PlayStation for three years after the current agreement expires, but that deal was deemed inadequate by Sony's gaming chief Jim Ryan."The main supposed potential anticompetitive risk So
  
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• Crypto Exchange Gemini Trying To Recover $900 Million From Crypto Lender Genesis

  06-12-2022 02:25 via slashdot.org
  Crypto broker Genesis and its parent company Digital Currency Group (DCG) owe customers of the Winklevoss twins' crypto exchange Gemini $900 million, the Financial Times reported on Saturday. Reuters reports: Crypto exchange Gemini is trying to recover the funds after Genesis was wrongfooted by last month's failure of Sam Bankman-Fried's FTX crypto group, the newspaper said, citing people familiar with the matter. Venture capital company Digital Currency Group, which owns Genesis Trading and cry
  
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• How 'Goblin Mode' Became Oxford's Word of the Year

  06-12-2022 01:45 via tech.slashdot.org
  This year, Oxford Languages, the creator of the Oxford English Dictionary, titled "goblin mode" as the 2022 Word of the Year, meaning it best reflected the ethos and mood of the past 12 months. The slang term is defined as a "type of behavior which is unapologetically self-indulgent, lazy, slovenly, or greedy, typically in a way that rejects social norms or expectations." NPR reports: The term first appeared on Twitter in 2009 but didn't go viral until 2022, according to Oxford Languages. "It ca
  
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• Company 'Hijacks' Blender's CC BY-Licensed Film, YouTube Strikes User

  06-12-2022 01:02 via news.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from TorrentFreak: The Blender Institute develops Blender, a free and open source 3D graphics tool used to create animated films. Sintel and Big Buck Bunny are among Blender's most recognizable titles and due to Creative Commons licensing (CC BY), they are widely shared, used, remixed and reshared. According to original Blender creator Ton Roosendaal, "Open licenses are essential for sharing our films and their source material." Right now, a company is claimin
  
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• Sam Bankman-Fried Says He Will Testify Before Congress On FTX Collapse

  06-12-2022 00:20 via yro.slashdot.org
  FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried promised to testify before Congress after he finished "learning and reviewing" the events that caused the popular cryptocurrency exchange to file for bankruptcy last month. The Verge reports: Bankman-Fried's promise was made in response to a tweet from House Financial Services Chair Maxine Waters (D-CA) last week calling on him to join the committee's hearing on FTX's collapse on December 13th. But Bankman-Fried didn't commit to testifying at the hearing scheduled f
  
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